


Pigtails

by audreycritter



Series: Cor Et Cerebrum [11]
Category: Batman (Comics), Batman - All Media Types
Genre: Adoption, Angst, Follow-up, Gen, Grocery Store, Tumblr Prompt, some mild goofing off, white people yogurt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-18
Updated: 2017-01-18
Packaged: 2018-09-18 08:14:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,001
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9376226
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/audreycritter/pseuds/audreycritter
Summary: From a tumblr flash fiction prompt.Dev and Steph run an errand for Alfred that ends up involving an unexpected encounter with the past. Set after the end of Developmental Milestones and Out Here Hope Remains.





	

Kiran Devabhaktuni turned the key in the ignition and the engine died down with a gentle hiss, and he bent over the steering wheel laughing.

“You plonker,” he accused, trying to catch his breath. “You nearly made us wreck.”

“I told you I knew all the words to the Gaston song,” Steph smirked, pressing pause on her phone. “You never should have doubted me.”

“I won’t again, bloody hell,” Dev said, climbing out of the car. “Right then, come on. Let’s get this over with.”

They walked toward the Whole Foods store together as a fall breeze blew across the car park. Steph pulled her hair back into a ponytail as they walked.

“What’s the list, then?” Dev asked as they stopped to get a cart.

Steph pulled a piece of folded paper out of her pocket and read through it.

“Organic raspberries, ginger anise tea, gluten free oat flour, dairy-free carob chips, and Siggi’s fl–fil–something.”

“Oh, so you can sing along with Disney but you can’t read?” Dev teased, taking the list. He glanced down at it. “Siggi’s something,” he confirmed in a heartbeat, not even attempting the word.

“Ha,” Steph said. “Don’t talk smack until you know you can play.”

The interior sliding doors opened with a faint whine and they stepped into the air conditioned market. The produce aisles beckoned, every unit made of polished wood and glass.

“I don’t think I can afford to breathe here,” Steph said, making a face as she looked around.

“Wayne’s paying,” Dev answered, “so breathe as deeply as you like. We’ll charge all the rarefied oxygen to his account.”

“I dunno,” Steph said, taking the list back to look at it again. “Our lower class carbon dioxide might kill the floral displays.”

“That joke is rife with Timothy Wayne’s influence,” Dev commented, coming to a stop in front of the raspberries. There were five different kinds and all of them were labeled ‘organic.’

“Shite,” he muttered, looking at them.

“I can make smart jokes,” Steph protested. “Tim doesn’t have a monopoly on intelligence.”

“You’re absolutely right,” Dev agreed, taking one of each raspberry carton. “And I’m sorry.”

“We could text him,” Steph said with a skeptical glance at all the raspberries. “This is like…oh my god it’s $45 worth of fruit. I don’t think I’ve ever…ugh. Never mind, just, let’s keep going. Why didn’t we go to Shop n Save again? Remind me.”

“Alfie’s instructions,” Dev said, “and if we muck this up, you know full well he’ll never let us run an errand again.”

“Ginger anise tea,” Steph read off. “So, basically, medicinal licorice.”

Dev snorted a short burst of laughter and then sighed, “Bollocks, speaking of tea, I had far too many cups this afternoon.”

“There has to be a bathroom,” Steph said, looking around, “but it might cost us.”

Dev laughed again, spotted the aisle for hot beverages and shook his head.

“Nah, I’m quite alright. Everything’s just a bit funnier than usual.”

“So, normally I’m not funny?” Steph demanded with a mock-offended gasp and hand to her chest. “I try so hard and I never get any thanks from this family.”

“Trying too hard is likely the problem,” Dev shot back, turning the cart sharply.

“Uncle Dev,” Steph said seriously, stopping dead in the aisle so he slowed and looked back at her. “I’m gonna need some burn ointment for that. We should pour this much tea into you all the time.”

“Alfie tries,” Dev said, scanning the shelves. “Come look. There’s a million of them.”

“Good Posture Tea,” Steph read off. “Midday Detox with Jasmine Blossom. Hint of Passion Brew. Oleander Oil with Calm Blend. God, this is the whitest place I’ve ever been in my entire life.”

“Oleander is poisonous,” Dev frowned. “I’m quite certain.”

“Maybe it’s for killing yourself,” Steph said. “When you’re standing here and realize what you’ve become.”

“It’s not that awful,” he scolded gently. “Alfie shops here.”

“Yeah, for Bruce,” Steph retorted. “But I can play nice. It’s just all this money makes me nervous. I could eat for a week for what this tin costs.”

She picked up a metal tin of ginger anise tea and handed it to him.

“‘Sachets,’” she said in a prim and high tone. “Not tea bags, ‘sachets.’”

“We’ve fancy flour to find,” Dev said, dropping the tea tin into the cart. “Let’s hurry before you implode from your money allergy. I’ve not an epipen with me.”

“Har har,” she said dryly, leading the way.

They found the flour and the carob chips easily enough and wandered around aimlessly for ten minutes joking and laughing while trying to find the last item without even knowing what category of food it was, until Dev gave up and asked an employee.

“A yogurt smoothie,” Steph said, when they’d been led to the dairy fridge unit. “Why not just say ‘yogurt smoothie’?”

Dev contemplated the flavors and went again with one of each.

“It makes people feel sophisticated to eat foods they can’t pronounce,” Dev said, looking a bottle over. “It’s a social construct oddity, the juxtaposition of ignorance and perceived superiority.”

“Don’t justify them with science,” Steph warned, “and Bruce probably does know how to say it. He probably can speak the whole language.”

“Finnish, I think. And it’s not justification, it’s analysis.”

“You and Nerdface are a match made in heaven, I hope you know. I’m not even listening anymore. I’m going to make Bruce pay for a mango pineapple yogurt smoothie for me, though.”

“Do you see any savory ones?” Dev asked, scanning the shelf.

“What the hell kind of question is that?” Steph demanded, laughing. “Ew, no. I won’t let you. For your own good.”

“Not for me,” he said defensively. “I just want to observe the depths to which people will–”

Dev stopped because he realized Steph wasn’t paying attention. She had been standing next to him, leaning over the case, but had turned at a sound behind them and her whole body had gone rigid.

He straightened and glanced at her face, which was blank and paper white, her eyes wide.

“Steph, love?” he asked, concerned, turning to follow her gaze.

Across the aisle, by a display of cubed and sliced cheeses, a woman in yoga pants and a messy bun was pushing a cart. A small girl with plump, round cheeks and dirty-blonde hair pulled into pigtails was in the child seat, slurping a juice box and giggling at whatever the woman was saying to her.

“Steph,” he said again.

She swallowed, her eyes still locked on the child.

“I’m going to go wait in the car,” Steph said without moving, her words small and tight like the set of her shoulders.

“It’s locked,” he said quickly, fishing the keys out of his pocket. He put them in her hand and without turning back, she ducked her head down and left him standing in the aisle with the cart. The woman put a pack of cut shapes of cheese in with her own groceries and moved on.

Dev took his time going to the register. He paid and tucked the receipt in his wallet, requested paper bags, and lingered for a bit at an exit display of snacks pretending to study the labels.

When he forced himself to move on, he walked slowly with the cart. Wordlessly, he opened the boot of the hatchback and transferred the bags. In the passenger seat, there was a deep sniffle. He closed the boot and took the cart to a corral.

Then, finally, he opened the driver’s door and sat behind the wheel. For a long time, he didn’t even look over, wishing he could give her more time or space. But he also couldn’t bring himself to drive off without addressing her or the situation, and besides, he didn’t have the keys and couldn’t see where she’d put them.

Dev looked over and Steph was looking down at her hands, clasped on her lap. She wasn’t crying, but when she lifted her head to meet his worried frown, her eyes were puffy and red.

“I…” she started and stopped.

“Steph, love, there’s no way of knowing it was–”

He wasn’t sure why he thought this would be reassuring but she was already staring back down at her hands and fiercely shaking her head.

“No,” she said. “On her good days, my mom used to do my hair like that. I have pictures. She looked exactly like–” her breath caught and she put a hand over her mouth, fingers pale with the pressure. After a moment, she pulled her hand back. “It was her. I just know. It was her.”

“Alright,” Dev said, shoving his own doubts down. They didn’t really matter, after all.

“I mean, it’s a good thing, right?” Steph asked, with a forced and tearful smile. She used her thumbs to scrape stubborn drops away from the inside corners of her eyes. “I’ve wondered for so long, and, I mean, at least…”

“She looked happy,” Dev said, when she trailed off.

“Yeah, yeah,” Steph nodded. “And it looked like a mom and not a nanny. And they shop here, which means, like, I was thinking about it while you were still inside, and it means they’ve got money, right? And they take good care of her?”

“Yeah, absolutely,” Dev agreed, dismissing his own inner protest that the two things weren’t always correlated. It, again, didn’t matter, and the girl had seemed cheerful and at ease. Those were the more important things. “She looked well, Steph. Honestly.”

Steph nodded again and buckled the seatbelt and handed him the keys.

“Sorry I just left you there,” Steph mumbled.

“It’s quite alright,” Dev said gently. “Would you rather me drop you off somewhere else? Home?”

“No, I’m okay,” Steph said. “Let’s just go back to the manor before Alfred worries.”

“Steph,” Dev said again. “You don’t have to–”

“I’m fine,” she snapped, sniffing again. “Please. Let’s just go.”

Dev put the keys into the ignition but he didn’t turn them. He sighed and looked across the car park, and then put a hand on her shoulder and squeezed, once.

Steph curled her legs up on the seat of the car and wrapped her arms around them, leaned across the small middle divider of the hatchback to rest her head on his upper arm, and sucked in a long, shuddering breath.

They sat in the car park like that, not moving, for a long time. When it started to get too stuffy, Dev turned the keys just enough for the battery, and cracked the windows, and then turned it back off.

“Thank you,” she said quietly, sounding steady, when she sat back up and stretched out again. “For being patient.”

“Sure,” he said. “You should get all the bloody time you need.”

Steph nodded, a tiny and quick jerk of her head, and he turned the car on.

“I’m glad, I think. I mean it. It was good to see her okay.”

“You let me know if you’ve a need to talk,” Dev said, a little sternly. “And I’ll listen or find somebody. Babs or Leslie if you’d rather.”

“I will,” Steph agreed. “But just getting to sit and think helped a lot. I’m ready to go. I’ve got some yogurt smoothies to give Bruce a hard time about.”

Dev grinned even though his heart ached for her. He knew she was doing the same thing, but that the afternoon would go on and it would ebb and flow with time.

“I’ll help,” he promised. “He’ll regret ever putting them on the list.”

“Please shout at him,” Steph said, her eyes bright and haunted at once, excitement covering a far away reserve. “If you yell and make him nervous about yogurt, it’ll make my day.”

“Steph, love, you don’t have to beg,” Dev said, as they pulled out of the car park. “I love to shout at Wayne. Consider it done.”

**Author's Note:**

> This started as a five minute prompt and spiraled beyond that. I'm sorry for the angst but I am very dedicated to the idea of Stephanie Brown getting some time to cope with trauma/decisions and taking that part of her story seriously.


End file.
